David Cherry's blog

Like ice cream for breakfast, a pet boa constrictor, and face tattoos, snow sounds great in theory, but if you ask folks who have to face the stuff day in-day out, they have a very different take on it. This week, Book Hunters in Brief gives you and your young ones a chance to enjoy some winter wonderlands in the best possible way: from a nice, warm sofa with cups of hot cocoa. Enjoy!

We are delighted to announce that we have added Pronunciator, a new language-learning tool to our roster of online resources. Pronunciator features live tutors, movies, music lyrics and more to make learning fun and easy, as well as drills, quizzes, virtual coaching and other features to keep you on track.

If you want another reason to visit the library with your kids, here’s one: ABCMouse in the house! ABCMouse is an online service that offers over five thousand fun, interactive books, games, puzzles and more for children ages 2 - 7 years.
The makers of ABCMouse, Age of Learning, Inc., are now offering it free of charge for in library use to all Harris County Public Library customers.

It’s easy to get started. ABCMouse is installed on all library computers that kids can use. You just click on your child’s age, choose an avatar and go. But we suggest you create a free login that you can use whenever you visit the library. That way you can save your child’s progress and pick up right where you left off the next time you come in.

He's the original mouse that roared, and built an empire. From his beginnings as Steamboat Willie, he now has his four-fingered, white-gloved hand in some very lucrative pies ranging from the four-letter TV sports behemoth to far-flung amusement complexes in places like Paris and Hong Kong.

Even with a prodigious imagination like Walt Disney's, it is hard to imagine he dared to imagine his little flickering, black and white rodent would be so phenomenally successful.

So, let's all raise a cup of Ovaltine to Mickey on the occasion of his 88th birthday.

You’ve heard a lot about eBooks. You’re curious and wonder what all the fuss is about, but don’t really want to drop your hard-earned cash on a Kindle so you can find out. Now, you don’t have to. You can borrow a Kindle Touch from us to take home and try out. It’s simple; you check it out just like other library books. Yes. Really.

• You can find one in the catalog just like any other item. Search: kindle touch
• If your HCPL branch doesn’t have one on hand, you can request one online and pick it up when it arrives.
• You can use the Kindle to check out free eBooks from HCPL’s collection or download books available on Amazon.com
• You get to keep it for two weeks.
• All you need is an HCPL library card.

Harris County Public Library is the first library system in Texas to circulate one million eBooks in a calendar year

Last January, we challenged you to checkout a million eBooks in 2016 and, in the process, make HCPL the first library system in Texas to circulate a million eBooks in a calendar year. Your response was overwhelming to put it mildly. We are delighted to announce that on Thursday, November 10, one of you put us over the top--with fifty days left in the year! That is an average of 2,500 or so eBooks checked out every day.

All of us at HCPL want to congratulate everyone who helped us toward the goal, whether you checked out five eBooks or fifty or more, you made a difference. We knew you were up to the task, but we had no idea that you would embrace Project Mill-E with such gusto. Thank you all.

In the end, Project Mill-E is not about numbers or bragging rights, Edward Melton, Harris County Public Library’s Director.sees it as evidence of the continued transformation in the ways our customers access information and entertainment, and the necessity for the library to adapt to them, “HCPL and public libraries in general, are constantly evolving and changing to better meet the information needs of the community regardless of the format.”

November is Citizenship Month in Houston which both civic engagement that true citizenship entails as well as "the vibrant mix of native Houstonians, transplants from other cities and states, Immigrants, refugees, foreign students and international resident workers."

Book Hunters is doing its part with this offering of reads for adult and youth:

Millions of years of evolution was aimed at one thing: to make it possible not to live in a constant state of fear. Our big brains allowed us to out think those that would make us their lunch, our forward facing eyes enabled us to see them before they could decide whether we would taste better broiled, fried or fricasseed, and our opposable thumbs let us make weapons so that we could make them OUR lunch as well as build shelters in which to enjoy the meal in comfort.

And what do we do as soon as our safety becomes more or less a given? We invent stories to scare ourselves witless.